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Declension of the accusative case

The nouns of the accusative case have a change in their endings compared to the nominative case. You can recognize the accusative by their articles and/or the adjectives prefixed, the gender and the number. Have also a look into the course of articles and adjectives.

Weak and mixed masculine nouns take the suffix -n /-en to the singular and plural accusative. This is also called the N-declension.

The substantivized verbs (the present and past participles) and adjectives take the suffix -n /-en to the singular and plural accusative because they behave like adjectives.

Table of declension of the article and the noun in the accusative case

In this table you can find several examples for the declension of noun and their articles in the different genders. In addition, there are some examples of adjectives that accompany a noun in the accusative case.

Masculine

Feminine

Neuter

Plural

With a definite article

den Mann

die Frau

das Kind

die Leute

With an indefinite article

einen Mann

eine Frau

ein Kind

Leute

With a definite article + adjective

den gutenMann

die schöneFrau

das junge Kind

die alten Leute

With an indefinite article + adjective

einen gutenMann

eine schöne Frau

ein jungesKind

alteLeute

Translation

den alten Mann - the old man

die schöne Frau - the beautiful woman

das junge Kind - the young child

die alten Leute - the old people

Remember: there is no indefinite article in plural

Table of personal pronouns in the accusative case

In the accusative case you have to decline pronouns too. They are listed in this table.

Type of person

Pronoun

First person singular

mich - me

Second person singular

dich - you

Third person singular

ihn / sie / es - him/her/it

First person plural

uns - us

Second person plural

euch - you

Third person plural

sie / Sie - them/you

How do you use the accusative case in German?

The accusative case is used in several cases.

As the direct Object of the verb

With expressions of definite time and duration of time

With prepositions

With verbs of movement and contracted prepositions

With sentence in passive

As the direct object of the verb

All transitive verbs support the direct object and for this reason are followed by the accusative.

With expressions of definite time and duration of time

Nominal groups that express the frequency of an activity or a time are always in the accusative case.

Examples:

Ich gehe jeden Monat ins Theater. - I go to the theater every month.

Fliegen wir diesen Sommer nach Polen? - Are we going to fly to Poland in the summer?

Die Reise hat eine Woche gedauert. - The trip lasted one week.

Sophia isst jeden Tag Gemüse. - Sophia eats vegetables every day.

Nächstes Jahr fahre ich nach Hamburg. - Next year I will go to Hamburg.

The accusative form is also used for a date. Here the article der is transformed to den.

Köln, den 06.07.2018

With prepositions

There are some prepositions that always followed by the accusative case.

bis - until

für - for

um - by/ for

gegen - against

durch - by/through

entlang - along

ohne - without

wider - contrary/against

Examples:

Ich kaufe Blumen für meine Oma. - I buy flowers for my grandma.

Ohne meinen Vater ist das Haus nicht mehr dasselbe. - Without my father, the house is no longer the same.

Ich kämpfe gegen ihn. - I fight agains him.

Der Zug fährt durch den Tunnel. - The train goes through the tunnel.

With verbs of movement and contracted prepositions

There are verbs that, depending on the action (whether it is static or a movement), govern the dative or the accusative case. The dative case is used when it comes to static verbs and the accusative case is used with movement.

Here is a list of verbs of movement:

gehen - to go

fahren - to drive

fliegen - to fly

sich setzen - to sit

(auf)stehen - to stand (up)

(sich) legen - to lay / to put

(sich) stellen - to put / to set

hängen - to hang

stecken - to stick / to put

There are contracted prepostions that are used in the accusative case and also require a verb of movement. Contracted prepositions exists, when the preposition is followed by the definite article das. Let's have a look into this table of examples.

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